


The Cat's Claws

by Miss M (missm)



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Bitterness, F/F, Internalized Homophobia, POV Second Person, Unrequited Desire
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-05-05
Updated: 2012-05-05
Packaged: 2017-11-04 21:45:52
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,011
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/398522
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/missm/pseuds/Miss%20M
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>You will make her pay, at last, for your flushing cheeks and sleepless nights and dreams that came to naught.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Cat's Claws

**Author's Note:**

  * For [kelly_chambliss](https://archiveofourown.org/users/kelly_chambliss/gifts).



> Written for Kelly Chambliss in the 2011 round of hp_beholder. Thanks so much to Redsnake05 for the beta!

This is why you hate her: cold superiority in every movement, mouth pursed, hair pulled back, a stern gaze through square glasses that lets you know just how much she looks down on you. Prim and proper, she's not unlike the supposed librarians in the pornographic Muggle magazines some of your classmates used to smuggle into the school and sometimes, as a cruel joke, leave on your bed. Like them, she seems every bit the sexless spinster, right until the moment when she pulls off her glasses, shakes out her hair, slips her clothing off to reveal naked skin. You know what she looks like, then: you've pictured it in detail, more times than you care to count.  
  
Such a vulgar cliché, and yet no one else seems to see it; instead, she is well-respected, well-liked, well-feared, all the things you yourself have always wanted to be. This, together with all the other things, is why you hate her, that Gryffindor smugness of an old cat who's never felt the lack of milk, never had to fight for her place in the world. All of this is why you hate her, all of this is why you want her, two sides of an old wound that keeps nagging, burning, deep beneath your skin.  
  
  
***  
  
  
 _"If you would pay a little attention to what I was saying, Miss Umbridge, you would not cause your House to lose so many points."  
  
"Yes, Professor, but I --"  
  
"Detention this afternoon, Miss Umbridge. Mr Filch's office, five o'clock."_  
  
  
***  
  
  
It's her fault, you tell yourself as you carefully choose your outfits, all pink femininity so that nobody will suspect. She started it, back then, and it has never gone away. She made you burn, back then, with deviant desires and anger and frustration; she made you stutter and stumble and lose your stride; she made you feel ugly and clumsy and _wrong._  
  
Of course, she never showed any sign of doing it on purpose. Indeed, you might as well have been air to her. She never did anything that would have been considered unseemly or out of place, no matter how much you wanted her to, no matter how much you hated her for this, no matter how much you hated yourself.  
  
She's good at that, playing by the rules, being in charge and exercising her authority. So you have waited, patiently, for the day when you are in charge and Minerva McGonagall will have to leave or else surrender. And you will make her pay, at last, for your flushing cheeks and sleepless nights and dreams that came to naught.  
  
  
***  
  
  
 _"But Professor, he started it! He called me a t--"  
  
"Enough with the excuses, Miss Umbridge."_  
  
  
***  
  
  
But you know well enough by now that if she made you a deviant, it's because she herself is one. Even if you hadn't known back then, with some strange certainty, you do now. You've paid attention and you've been rewarded with unmistakable proof: little touches, quick smiles, lingering gazes that say it all. _Hooch_ \-- you taste the word, make a face, spit it out. Sitting in your office, steeping your tea, you think of your own schooldays, when there was another flying instructor. Did another woman stealthily visit her chambers then? You don't know, and it frustrates you.  
  
You sip your tea, watching the kittens on your wall. Adorable, young things, easy to love, no claws or teeth that bite. You'd like the students to be more like them. You'd like her to be more like them. What does it matter that they will never love you back?  
  
  
***  
  
  
 _"This isn't fair, Professor. They'd broken the rules, and I caught --"  
  
"That will do, Miss Umbridge; I won't hear another word."_  
  
  
***  
  
  
The blood on the boy's hand reminds you of secret fantasies, of nails -- like cat's claws -- on soft skin, and you stare, hungrily, thinking of punishment and power, of silent screams, of giving pain that might turn into pleasure.  
  
Later, in your bed, you touch yourself, all pretense of daintiness gone. Hard angry motions, a hand between your legs, another cupping a breast, the way she touches Hooch, the way Hooch touches her. You imagine burying your face between her breasts, her hair winding about you both like it winds about her and Hooch when they kiss, when they rut against each other, stroke and bite each other with beastly force, the way you've seen so many times, the way you see it now, vivid in your mind as life itself as you rub yourself and gasp and moan along with them.  
  
Afterwards, you spell your hands clean, smoothe down your blankets, and lie down to sleep, trying not to think of anything at all.  
  
  
***  
  
  
 _"Yes, Miss Umbridge, that is indeed correct. Is there anything else you came to see me about?"  
  
"I... No, Professor."_  
  
  
***  
  
  
This is why you hate her: cold superiority, smug primness, a hidden heat that she will never share with you, a protective streak that really should not exist in women like her. When the Stunners hit, you cry out in anger, both at the fools who attacked her and at her idiocy in meddling where she had no business meddling, trying to save the half-breed oaf. After they've taken her to the hospital wing, you go to your office, sit down, make yourself a cup of tea. You watch the kittens, decorative and lifeless and forever yours.  
  
You know what she looks like, now: you've seen her stiff body, not young anymore and seriously damaged by the spells that were fired four against one. You've seen Hooch, pale and trembling, hovering over her bed, not caring who might notice. You've seen proof, yet again, of just how much she's well-respected, well-liked, well-feared.  
  
She has left, though not surrendered. As you sit in your office, you think of the job that remains: the school is yours now, even though she isn't. That has to be enough.  
  
You go to bed, shut out the noise from the castle and the forest, and tell yourself to enjoy your victory.


End file.
